On a per capita basis, though, twice as many foreign fighters came to Iraq from Libya -- and specifically eastern Libya -- than from any other country in the Arabic-speaking world. Libyans were apparently more fired up to travel to Iraq to kill Americans than anyone else in the Middle East. And 84.1% of the 88 Libyan fighters in the Sinjar documents who listed their hometowns came from either Benghazi or Darnah in Libya's east. This might explain why those rebels from Libya's eastern provinces are not too excited about U.S. military intervention.

Indeed. No analysis of Libya and the regional revolt in which it is embedded can have any credibility whatever if it doesn't place imperialism at its centre.